The present invention relates to a Doppler ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus for diagnosing motion fluid such as blood flow in vivo by utilizing a Doppler effect of ultrasonic waves.
Conventionally, it is known that a Doppler ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus uses an ultrasonic pulse Doppler technique and an ultrasonic pulse reflection technique, thereby acquiring a tomographic Image (a monochrome mode image) and blood flow information by a single ultrasonic probe and displaying at least the blood flow information in real time.
In this Doppler ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus, in recent years, a frequency that meets conditions for setting a maximum blood flow velocity or gravity blood flow velocity and the like on a Doppler frequency spectrum based on the acquired blood flow information is traced in real time or after freeze operation. Then, characteristics velocities such as average flow velocity value, maximum flow velocity, minimum flow velocity is obtained from a time change curve of a blood flow velocity obtained from this trace processing result. There is proposed a method for calculating and diagnosing various physical quantities (hereinafter, referred to as "index (index value)" such as PSV (Peak Systolic Velocity) or EDV (End Diagnostic Velocity) using this velocity. In this case, in a course up to performing diagnosis from the acquired blood flow information, frequency trading is automatically performed, thereby making it possible to significantly reduce the operation quantity and operation time of an operator in comparison with a case when that tracing is manually performed.
However, in the above mentioned conventional Doppler ultrasonic diagnosis apparatus, in the case where index is measured and diagnosed by employing the trace results of the frequency that meets the setting conditions on the Doppler spectrum, the following problem will occur.
That is, in the case of the conventional apparatus, although frequency tracing itself is automatically performed, an operation for selecting a spectrum targeted for diagnosis by reproducing a freeze memory or an operation for determining a heart beat targeted for measurement by specifying a time range (ROI: region of interest) of the spectrum targeted for mesurement must still be manually performed. Among them, in particular, specifying ROI requires very strict position specifying work, and thus, operation Is prone to be difficult. In addition to this, In the case of tracing after freezing, an operation for instructing the start of tracing is required, or in the case of real-time tracing, when the tracing result is set to non-display, an operation for specifying the start of display is required. Therefore, in view of the operation quantity and operation time of the entire diagnosis, an operation portion to be performed manually is still considerably large.
On the other hand, in the case where blood flow information is traced in real time, index calculation is performed in real time based on the trace processing result. However, there is a problem that it is very difficult for the operator to monitor the calculated index in real time. Moreover, it is impossible to calculate the time change of the index calculated in real time and reflect it on an freeze operation or the like.